Barasa wants ICC lawyer, investigator probed

October 30, 2013 4:05 pm

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By WAMBUI NDONGA, Barasa argued that the court should stop focusing on his extradition to The Hague and focus on the accusations that these two are facing from three former prosecution witnesses/FILENAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 30 – Activist Walter Barasa now wants the International Criminal Court (ICC) to press charges against Senior Trial Attorney Cynthia Tai and investigator Paul Irani accusing them of abusing due process in the administration of justice.

Barasa argued that the court should stop focusing on his extradition to The Hague and focus on the accusations that these two are facing from three former prosecution witnesses.

He says that they intimidated the witnesses after they indicated their desire to withdraw from the case in addition to falsely accusing him of bribing witnesses.

“It is therefore ironical that I am the one being accused of having committed such offences when the evidence clearly points out that the said Ms Cynthia Tai and Paul Irani are potentially guilty of such crimes,” says Barasa in his affidavit.

While writing to the Nairobi High Court, the 41-year old said that affidavits sworn by the former witnesses showed that the Office of the Prosecutor conducted shoddy investigations upon which his arrest warrant was issued.

He observed that one of those he is being accused by the ICC of bribing with between Sh1 and Sh1.5 million, has already come out and denounced the OTP findings.

“The Affidavit sworn by former ICC Witness K-0336 shows that the charges against me are founded on illegally obtained evidence,” he said.

Barasa is wanted by the ICC for allegedly bribing two prosecution witnesses among them P0336 (K0336) and attempting to bribe a third for them to drop out of the case.

He has already denied the charges and is currently embroiled in legal tussles at the High Court in Nairobi to block his extradition to the Dutch based Court.

In his affidavit, witness P0336 says that Barasa never bribed him and he did not understand why the prosecution was still listing him as one of its witnesses.

“I was surprised in early October 2013 by media reports indicating that the ICC had issued a warrant of arrest against the petitioner allegedly for interference with its witnesses including myself,” he said in the affidavit also lodged at the High Court in Nairobi.

The witness explained that he decided to ditch the case out of familial pressure and as a result of how the prosecution was mistreating the witnesses.

The sealed arrest warrant against Barasa was issued by Single Judge Cuno Tarfusser on August 2 before being made public on October 2.